LONG BLOG

"You know, man, whenever you do a review, you are always doing Genesis games! I thought you loved the SNES, and yet you are always going on about ducks and opposums dressed in knight armor. You got some sick fantasies, guy. SICK!" This is the thought that I am sure many of you are thinking whenever you read my blog, and I hear you guys (literally; please stop, because hearing all your thoughts at once is like a vuvuzela blaring endlessly). Listen, I do love the SNES, perhaps even too much. There are too many games that I absolutely adore, and I want to talk about all of them. Then I remembered back to the time of the beat-em-up, and thought about an age-old question: Which is the best one? Games like Streets of Rage 2, Final Fight, Double Dragon, and Scott Pilgrim are all exceptional sidescrolling beat-em-ups, but there was always one brawler that I felt stood above all the rest. I am of course talking about Turtles in Time, featuring your favorite artists-turned-tutles-that Michael Bay is now turning into aliens (he won't stop until all our childhood memories are sullied beyond recognition, my friends).

When you start Turtles in Time, the coolest thing you'll notice (if you can be bothered to go into the options) is that you can change the Turtles' look from their 90's cartoon look to their original comic look, complete with pupil-less eyes and original color scheme! Anyway, start playing and you'll hear the awesome cry of "COWABUNGA!" emanating from your television, and then you can pick your turtle (I call dibs on Raph; god help you if you choose Raph before me). You will begin in New York City, because Krang just stole the Statue of Liberty (for reasons never fully explained; maybe he's just lonely?). Players can run by holding the direction they are facing, and shoulder charge (press Y) or do a fancy slide flip thing (press B + Y). Your shoulder attack is vital to becoming an expert fighter and key to your survival: when you charge, you stun the enemy, and can bash them from left to right for a few seconds if you are right next to them and hit Y, clearing out enemies to your sides in one hit. If you stun them and press the direction you are facing AND Y, you will throw them at the screen like that shot up above, which is not nearly as useful as the happy-smashy-smashy attack (but you will need to use it to kill a certain boss who likes to SHRED. HAHA! *Buries head in shame*).

Gamers will get to the Technodrome by level 4, and ask themselves, "THAT'S IT?!" No, that isn't it; did you even read the title? The level itself is quite fun because it has Tokka and Rahzar from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II as bosses (remember Vanilla Ice and the Ninja Rap? I used to have that on CD and dance to it when I was a kid! *Cries bitter tears*). You get to go on a trip through time after the Technodrome, from dinosaurs to pirates to the distant future. By this time, you will notice that you really can't afford to take too much of a beating; a few hits will bring you close to death, and certain attacks like the robot's electric lasso will drain HALF YOUR LIFE. There are 4 solutions to this dilemma: get better, drop the difficulty down to easy, up the lives in the options, or go out into the real world and make a friend, maybe even just for the sole purpose of beating Turtles in Time (you hollow, hollow person). Beat-em-ups are always more fun with a friend by your side: they are always watching your back, defeating enemies, and stealing the pizza for health even though you CLEARLY had less life than they did; I swear, nobody has any common sense or courtesy. Everyone will have a blast with the two bonus stages (including one that is all vertical and shows off Mode 7 even more than the flying enemies): you get to collect pizza boxes and kill enemies for points, including the dreaded PIZZA MONSTER (which looks like a Xenomorph made entirely out of cheese; god, that sounds creepily delicious).

If you are hankering for some turtlin' brawlin' with or without a friend, make sure to hunt down the SNES port of Turtles in Time. The SNES version has added enemies, levels, and bosses, though they did just up and replace some from the arcade version. I'm sure no one would ever remake the shorter, less impressive arcade version, make it 3D, and replace all the voices with the 2003 cast of the Turtles cartoon(*cough*UBISOFT*cough*). Experience this game: it has wonderful music, sound effects (I love hearing Raph scream "MY TOE!" when he steps on a spiked mine), levels, and even includes a time trial and versus mode for added fun. See if you also think that this is the finest beat-em-up ever made, and always be thankful for the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles; if it wasn't for them, we never would love pizza as much as we do today.

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About NakedBigBossone of us since 1:58 PM on 06.09.2012

My name is Arthur Damian, I am 32 years old, and I've been gaming since the NES era. I like the new school and the old school. Chrono Trigger is the bestest game ever, and Junction is the worstest. I love to write, and am currently working at Lehman College, helping students transfer in their credits from other universities. I also love vidja gamez, and right now I'm playing games on the PS4, even though I have a huge backlog of games on the Wii and 360 to go through. BLURG. I also work for That VideoGame Blog now as editor-in-chief, writing and editing daily news posts! YAY!